Parklife has just dropped the line-up for this year’s festival, with some absolutely massive names heading to Heaton Park in 2023.
The much-loved local festival will be welcoming headline performances from local boys The 1975, plus Moston’s very Aitch.
One of this year’s most-talked-about producers, Fred Again, is also among the headliners, plus all-time greats The Prodigy.
Parklife 2023 will also see Mercury-Prize winning Little Simz performing.
There’ll be an iconic collaborative show from hip-hop pioneers Wu Tang Clan + Nas: NY State Of Mind, playing together for the first time on stage in the UK.
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Parklife 2022. Credit: Jody Hartley
Every year, Parklife attracts tens of thousands of music-lovers to Heaton Park for a weekend of live music and the biggest names in dance, electronic and hip-hop.
This year’s event is set to take place on 10 and 11 June.
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Parklife will be expanded to 10 stages in 2023, with takeovers from the likes of Glitterbox, XXL, BBC Radio 1 Dance, DnB All Stars, Worried About Henry and more.
Looking ahead to his first major UK Festival Headline performance, Aitch says: “Buzzin to be headlining Parklife this year! It’s been one of my main goals since I started music so for it to be happening now at this point is unreal. I don’t care what happens after this, I’m happy.”
The Parklife 2023 line-up also includes performances from NxWorries (Anderson Paak. & Knxwledge), Skrillex, Becky Hill, Raye, Peggy Gou, an exclusive Michael Bibi b2b Jamie Jones set, Rudimental (Live), Self Esteem, Chase & Status (DJ), Confidence Man, FLO, Carl Cox, Overmono, Jon Hopkins, Nia Archives, Andy C, Annie Mac, Eliza Rose, LF System, Honey Dijon, JYOTY, JPEGMAFIA, Knucks, Shygirl, Mall Grab, Fisher, DJ EZ, The Blessed Madonna, Charlotte De Witte, Mimi Webb, Meekz, Hybrid Minds, TSHA and many more.
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More than 200,000 people have registered for pre-sale, which will begin at 10am on Thursday 2 February.
Any remaining tickets will go on sale at 10am on Friday 3 February.
Day tickets are priced from £85 plus booking fee, with full weekend tickets at £129.50 plus booking fee.
For more information and to get tickets, head to parklife.uk.com.
Featured image: Anthony Mooney
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A$AP Rocky announces huge Manchester gig on new world tour
Daisy Jackson
A$AP Rocky is heading out on a massive world tour, and is including a gig here in Manchester.
The rapper, producer, actor and entrepreneur has just announced his upcoming 2026 tour, the Don’t Be Dumb World Tour, with a whopping 42 dates across the globe.
This will be fans’ first chance to hear his latest album and first release in eight years, Don’t Be Dumb, live.
The huge A$AP Rocky tour kicks off this May in the USA, before heading across to Europe in July.
That leg will include a gig at the Co-op Live in Manchester on Saturday 5 September, one of only three UK shows on the tour.
The announcement has come hot on the heels of the release of his fourth album last week, which Billboard has said ‘not only rewards patience but adds new wrinkles to the rapper’s approach — an evolved relationship with melody and a wiser lyrical slant’.
It became Spotify’s most pre-saved hip-hop album, with one million saves even before its release.
As well as his music career, A$AP Rocky has starred in films including the Golden Globe-winning If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, and has cemented himself as a fashion icon with his work as co-chair of the 2025 Met Gala.
He’s also been announced as the creative director for Ray-Ban, and was appointed as Chanel’s new house ambassador.
General sale for the Don’t Be Dumb World Tour will go live at 9am on Tuesday 27 January HERE.
There’ll be artist pre-sales, a Mastercard pre-sale, and various VIP packages available too.
‘Manc the Biff’: the Co-op Live crowd made the Clyro boys welcome on debut
Danny Jones
It feels like we’ve been waiting a long time to welcome Biffy Clyro back to Manchester, and they really didn’t disappoint on their Co-op Live debut.
Here’s our review of what was a proper rock show.
After a strong lineup of support acts with The Armed and Soft Play (formerly Slaves) injecting plenty of early energy into the crowds, already knew two things: the Scots wouldn’t disappoint, and a Manc crowd NEVER lets you down.
We knew everyone was on top form from the moment the Kilmarnock icons stepped out on stage under a swathe of blankets to the opener from their latest album, Futique.
Once the curtain was eventually lifted during ‘A Little Love’, which has quickly become one of the most popular singles for some time, you could see the sea of fans below start bouncing.
Rolling into the likes of ‘Hunting Season’ and Only Revolutions classic, ‘The Captain’, those bounces quite quickly turned into a healthy-sized pit, and those up in the stands with us finally got on their feet.
That was maybe our only complaint: we love seeing a seated section pretending they’re in standing from their start, but we get it and each to their own, of course.
In fact, the same goes for the rest of the session players joining them on the road this year.
One thing we weren’t expecting was quite how cool the production levels were going to be. We’ve never been Biffy fans for their creativity when it comes to toying with stage design or lighting rigs, but they threw in some fun effects regardless.
Highlights from the night included ‘Tiny Indoor Fireworks’, ‘Bubbles’, and ‘Black Chandelier’, though we were sad not to hear ‘Victory Over The Sun’, and it was especially gutting that one of our favourite tracks from the new record, ‘True Believer’, didn’t end up on the setlist.
Again, you can’t have anything – we’re just glad we got to be there and see a truly great British rock band proving that they are well and truly an arena-level band.
Lastly, even after all the years and an X-Factor cover trying its hardest to take the credit away from them, ‘Many of Horror’ is still an unbelievable rock ballad, and d’ya know who is an unbelievable rock band? “Biffy. F***ing. Clyroooooo.”
Daisy Jackson -
1st February 2023 
